News and Views on Tibet

Australian Firm’s Gold Prospects Hit Tibet Wall

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BRISBANE, May 28 — A mining company planning to dig for gold in western China is on collision course with the Dalai Lama and Tibet’s government-in-exile.

Sino Gold, an Australian company, wants to mine at Jinkang, in Sichuan province. The company owns 51 per cent of Sino Mining Jinkang Ltd, which has exploration rights for 414 square miles. Although it will be at least six years before a mine would be dug there, initial tests indicate that it could be rich in gold.

The site is outside the Chinese-delineated Tibet Autonomous Region, but Tibetans claim that Jinkang is part of a former Tibetan kingdom and that it was within the eastern boundary of Tibet before China’s takeover in 1949.

To the Tibetan government-in-exile and its supporters, Jinkang remains Tibetan, and they object to what they see as their natural resources being exploited without their consent. Protesters told Sino Gold last week to “keep your hands off Tibet”.

The Dalai Lama, in a report written in the light of Sino Gold’s proposals, appealed to all foreign mining companies and their shareholders who were thinking about working in Tibet “to consider carefully ethical values when embarking on such a venture”

The Tibetan leader said: “This commercial and corporate interest comes at a time in Tibet’s history when ordinary Tibetans have no real say in their country’s development. Tibetans should be participating, directing and benefiting from this development, especially when it concerns the exploitation of Tibet’s non-renewable resources such as gold.”

The Australian Tibet Council said that these were strong words from Tibet’s usually reserved spiritual leader. Sino Gold said that it must “obey the sovereign laws of China”, but that it wanted to work with the local community so that it would benefit.

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